Crudo

by Olivia Laing

Based on the life of American experimental novelist Kathy Acker. Told in the first person; although sometimes 'I' is 'I' and sometimes 'she'! I found the writing style humorous and entertaining. Although Acker died in 1997, the novel is set in Europe in 2017. This enables 'Acker' to comment on current affairs e.g. Trump's presidency, Brexit and the NHS. Highly praised and definitely different. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Extract

It was uncomputable, it was the province of the novel, that hopeless apparatus of guesswork and supposition, with which Kathy liked to have as little traffic as possible.She wrote fiction, sure, but she populated it with the already extant, the pre-packaged and readymade. She was in many ways Warhol's daughter, niece at least, a grave-robber, a bandit, happy to snatch what she needed but also morally invested in the cause: that there was no need to invent, you could make anything from out of the overflowing midden of the already-done, the as Becket put it nothing new, it was economic also stylish to help yourself to the grab bag of the actual.

Parallels

The Lonely City: Adventures in the Art of Being Alone by Olivia Laing

Blue Self-Portrait by Noemi Lefebvre

happysad

funnyserious

safedisturbing

expectedunpredictable

larger than lifedown to earth

beautifuldisgusting

gentleviolent

easydemanding

no sexsex

conventionalunusual

optimisticbleak

shortlong

Character

Race

Black2

White5

Asian1

Mixed race3

Other culture4

Non-human6

Age

0-251

26-502

51-753

76+4

Sexuality

Straight2

Gay1

Bisexual3

Gender

Male1

Female2

We are working to add Non-binary to our gender choices. In the meantime, if you know any books with non-binary main characters you think we should include, please let us know.